Shadows After War
by Lomonaaeren
Summary: HPTN, Padma Patil/Susan Bones. Short epilogues and one-shot sequels to Shadow Magic. Harry, Theodore, and Harry's marked followers explore their new post-war world. Threeshot.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** Shadows After War  
 **Disclaimer:** J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.  
 **Pairing:** Established Harry/Theodore Nott, Padma Patil/Susan Bones,  
 **Content Notes:** AU, angst, violence, present tense  
 **Rating:** R  
 **Wordcount:** This part 1000 words  
 **Summary:** Short epilogues and one-shot sequels to _Shadow Magic._ Harry, Theodore, and Harry's marked followers explore their new post-war world.  
 **Author's Notes:** This story will make zero sense without you having read _Shadow Magic_ , so do that first. These are being posted as part of my "From Samhain to the Solstice" fic series. There will be three of them.

 **Shadows After War**

 _Sisters_

"I just want to know what made you choose it. I swear, Padma. That's all I want to know."

Padma sighs a little. The problem is, while she's sure that's all Parvati wants to know, that's not all she's going to _ask_. Padma could give her a simple answer, and then she would come back and demand a difficult one. And truly, Padma isn't sure how much she can convince a sister who _still_ hasn't taken Harry's mark.

"Okay," she says aloud. "Sit down."

Parvati takes a seat on the sofa in front of her, almost vibrating. A few people stare, but not many. Honestly, members of the different Houses mingle in each other's common rooms now far more than they did before the war ended. Padma isn't the only Ravenclaw who's had guests lately.

"You remember this?" Padma asks, and turns her hand so that Parvati can see the scars from Umbridge's quill.

Her sister flinches and looks up at Padma with eyes that beg for reassurance. The trouble is, Padma has no more reassurance to give. The end of the war brought them a lot of gifts, but not that one.

"You joined _him_ because you were angry at Umbridge?" Parvati whispers. Padma rolls her eyes at her twin. They're still close enough for that, or at least _Padma_ thinks so, although Parvati looks a little angry.

"You can call Harry by his name. He doesn't care. In fact, he keeps trying to get people _not_ to call him 'my lord' all the time." Padma smiles. She does it because it annoys Harry. But she knows him very well, and she can see when the shadows are stirring and it's not a good idea to press him. She always pulls away in time.

And she never calls him "my lord" in the soft, caressing tone that Theodore uses. She is wise enough never to do that.

Parvati swallows. "Fine. You joined _Harry_ because you were angry at Umbridge? That just seems like such a—petty motivation."

Padma raises one eyebrow. It's a talent that her twin has never managed to copy and always gets annoyed by. "I joined him for revenge. And because the quill scarring proved to me that the professors here weren't going to protect us. I wanted someone who would. Harry would go to the ends of the earth for his people. So I made a good choice."

"What happens when he turns on you?"

"Why would he turn on me?"

Her sincerely baffled tone seems to make an impression on Parvati, who pauses before she continues. "Because all Dark Lords get unstable in the end. We know that from studying _history_ , Padma. Don't tell me that you forgot it."

"Dark Lords do, but I don't think the wizarding world has ever had a Shadow Lord before," Padma says, her thoughts diverted for a second. She ought to try and find out if they have had one or not. But given how hard Harry looked for evidence of his own talent in books, he probably would have found something by now if it existed. "That's what he is, far more than a Dark Lord."

"I've heard about what he did to Voldemort."

"Defeated him," Padma tells her. She has her suspicions about what happened there, but it's not like she would share them with someone who isn't marked, even someone as dear to her as her twin sister. "And he did the same with the Dementors. You can't tell me that you feel bad about the demise of those awful things. You're not Granger, to feel compassion for every shred of magic in the world."

Parvati smiles reluctantly. "But it was so dark and horrid, what he did."

"Yes." Padma turns her hand over again. "So was this. And he was the only one who promised to do something about it. He made me strong enough that I never had to worry about being scarred again."

"The war's over now, though."

"You think it's going to _stay_ over if the people who made sacrifices to stop it just let it come creeping back?"

Parvati's face is a complicated study in things that Padma doesn't think she means for anyone to see. "No. Of course not. But—I thought we could leave that up to the Aurors and the Minister and the professors and the rest of it."

"Voldemort is gone, Dumbledore's disappeared. That's going to leave a power vacuum." Padma shrugs and picks up the advanced Defense book that she was reading before Parvati came in. "I'm going to do my best to survive in it."

"But you don't sound scared."

Padma touches the back of her shoulder, where the shadow wolf that Harry marks his followers with lies. "Because I have the tools and the allies to find myself a good place."

Parvati sighs softly at her and stands up. "I hoped to understand you, and I think I do. But you're harder and colder than I thought my sister was."

"Truth is better than ignorance."

From Parvati's troubled look, she doesn't agree. She turns and drifts out of the common room without saying anything.

Padma shakes her head. She hopes her sister will come to terms with the truth someday, which isn't the same thing as merely knowing it.

But there's nothing she can do about it. One thing Harry and the others have taught her is the uselessness of struggling to enlighten someone who doesn't want to be enlightened.

Padma goes back to her book.


	2. The Shadow Lord's Shadow

Thank you for the reviews!

 _The Shadow Lord's Shadow_

Theodore turns his head to watch Harry leaning back on the couch in front of their fireplace, his attention focused on the tome in his hands. His brows are furrowed, his fingers tapping on the cover, in a sure sign that whatever he's finding irritates him and certainly doesn't conform to what he expected to find.

Theodore can feel every shudder and tap of those fingers through his mark.

He knows that if he told Harry that, Harry would stop the movement and never do it again. He wouldn't apologize, but he would stop. That characterizes a lot of things Harry does, actually.

Theodore leans back and extends his leg from his own couch so one crosses Harry's. Harry shifts his entire attention to him—and Theodore shudders with the knowledge and the joy of it—without ever looking up from his book.

"What do you need, Theodore?"

"You, my lord."

Theodore does call him Harry, sometimes, in the privacy of their home, but he honestly prefers the title. Harry seems to think it separates them and makes them distant from each other, although Theodore isn't sure how much of that annoyance is mingled with the fact that Harry just doesn't _like_ the title. Or having vassals. Or being responsible for them. Or people watching him with fear and awe. Or basically anything that comes along with being called "Lord."

But Theodore sees it as a link. He was the first one to recognize Harry for what he was—although even now, to him, Harry bends the world he moves through so comprehensively that Theodore wonders how others don't see it—and no one else has that claim even if they call Harry the same thing.

Theodore knew, the moment he stepped into that compartment on the train, how much his world was going to change. He deserves to be rewarded for that insight.

Harry smiles, and his face floods with warmth. So often, he's cold, lingering in his shadows and looking at the world from around corners, or listening to private conversations. But Theodore knows how to value the power that Harry wields, and the coldness has never bothered him. It's never been directed _against_ him.

"Come here, then," Harry says, and extends his hand, a shadow unfurling further along the floor in invitation.

Theodore reaches out, grasps the cold mist of the shadow, and flickers through what looks like a high-sided path into a softness. He lands on their bed, gasping, and Harry stands next to him, smiling like Theodore is the jeweled center of the earth.

"You haven't moved us like that before, my lord," Theodore murmurs, carefully respectful and tilting his head back to watch as Harry undresses.

"I've been practicing." Harry winks at him and sheds his robe on the floor. He's naked underneath it except for a pair of pants. Shadows wrap him teasingly, though, flickering here and there like clouds across the sun, obscuring and then showing the bare skin Theodore wants so much to touch.

"Let's practice other things," Harry adds, and uses shadows to undress Theodore and pull his pants off at the same time.

Theodore is more than willing to do so.

* * *

Making love with Harry is like making love with a windstorm, or a shining waterfall, or some other great force of nature.

Theodore certainly can't complain of a lack of attention. Harry gives his full attention to this the way he gives his full attention to Theodore when he asks, or marking someone new when it's the dark of the moon and he can be persuaded to do it, or the books he studies. It's just that—

Theodore throws his head back, panting, and Harry, rocking on top of him, reaches down to bite the side of his neck. Theodore's mark flares even though Harry's teeth haven't actually touched it.

It's just that there's so _much_ of him.

The magic flares and twists and settles in the air, and cushions Theodore the way he's become used to it doing, as if he's lying on a second mattress suspended a little above the first one. Theodore focuses on the thrusts inside him and grips Harry's hair. Harry makes the low, thrilling sound that he did the first time Theodore did this, and that he's repeated every time since.

Theodore is glad he—

The thought shatters and breaks apart as Harry shoves into him again, his eyes wide and brilliant and fierce in a way they never are the rest of the time. The shadows are going wild on the walls, twisting around the two of them as if a fire has escaped the hearth.

Theodore kisses his lord, and Harry kisses back, his tongue driving into Theodore's mouth in imitation of the way his body drives into Theodore's. The shadows stop dancing and wrap close around them, a soft, gleaming blanket. Harry thrusts once more and shudders, and his shadows promptly curl close around Theodore's cock, rubbing him, too.

Theodore disappears into bliss for a second, but never loses the sense of his lord on top of him, inside him.

He relaxes enough to come back to his smug thought. Harry uses his shadows to make sure that both of them come at the same time, every time they make love.

Even if Harry had never spoken words of love, that gesture would tell Theodore everything he needs to know.

* * *

"Um, Nott?"

Theodore looks up, a little surprised. He has been shopping in Diagon Alley for something to give Harry for his birthday—a task that's always hard. Harry seems _pleased_ with every gift, but Theodore wants to get him something special, breathtaking, something to make his eyes brighten.

He puts aside the suspicion that someday he might not be able to, and face the woman he never thought would approach him. "Yes, Granger?"

For some reason, she flushes. Maybe there are Gryffindors in the crowds that she thinks would be angry she approached Theodore. Theodore doesn't keep track of that kind of thing himself. He has shadows following him that blend into the ones cast by buildings and fires and people walking and anything else they can find. He feels safe, as if he's still cradled on that extra mattress that the shadows form when he and Harry make love.

"I—I wanted to know if you would give this message to Harry for me." She stretches out her hand, to give him a folded piece of parchment.

Theodore takes it and flips it open to read it. Granger immediately tries to snatch it back. "You idiot!" she hisses. "You weren't supposed to _read_ it!"

"It wasn't sealed," Theodore says. "And of course I'm going to make sure that it isn't something dangerous before I give it to my lord."

"How can you call him that? When you're dating and everything."

Theodore shrugs. He will take some time to answer the questions of his fellow vassals, whom Harry insists on calling his "minions," but he doesn't owe anything to Granger. He scans her message instead.

 _Harry, this is Hermione Granger, who used to be in Gryffindor House. I need to talk to you. I'd like to debate the morality and politics of what you're doing with you. Will you agree to talk to me six days from now in front of the Ministry?_

Theodore laughs as he closes up the parchment again. "I'll give it to him, but I can tell you this now, Granger: he's not going to agree to meet you."

"Why not?" She's looking flustered again. "I thought that he was different from the rest, not all about blood purity."

"He doesn't give a damn about blood purity," Theodore agrees. "But he doesn't give a damn about people debating morality and politics with him, either. He only cares about the people who are close to him and his magic. That's it." If it wasn't for the library that fills Nott House, Theodore thinks that Harry wouldn't even care if they lived there. Harry could be in a hovel and be happy with books and Theodore and the others nearby.

"But he has to see that what he's doing is _wrong_!"

Theodore shrugs. "He doesn't think so."

"What would make him listen to me?"

"If you swore him a vow of loyalty and let him mark you."

"Then I would be betraying my principles!"

"Well, then you have no access to him." Theodore turns around to walk away.

Granger reaches towards him, but luckily stops before the shadow that's forming a puddle at Theodore's feet can reach her. Frostbitten fingers would be the _least_ she could expect if she touched him against his will.

"Can you just tell him I'd like to talk to him, Nott? Please?"

In the end, Theodore decides there's no harm in the verbal message, any more than in carrying the written one. "Just don't expect a good response, Granger," he calls over his shoulder as he disappears into the crowd.

* * *

"But Harry—"

"No."

Theodore grins a little as he sits back to watch the contest. Granger is leaning forwards as though she's about to get called on by Professor Snape, her elbows driving into her legs. She has a set of robes on that are nicer than the ones she wore at Hogwarts, but only barely. _Theodore_ would never wear robes like that to an audience with a Lord.

Then again, neither Harry nor Granger tend to think of Harry that way.

"You have to see that what you're doing is wrong." Granger's cheeks are flushed and her hand is curled into a fist that she drives into her knee next to her elbow. "Marking people? Not allowing them a choice about serving you? That's the same thing Voldemort did!"

Harry stares at her. Theodore would be worried if it was a flat stare or if the shadows on the floor were moving, but as it is, Harry huffs a minute later. "Not allowing them a choice? Merlin, Granger, do you know how many people I've turned away in the last year?"

"What?"

"Lots of them want to be marked but don't want to swear the oath. They want to be mine and acquire power without doing what's necessary to acquire it." Harry shakes his head and slumps back in his chair. "You want to speak to them and persuade them they should stop bombarding me with owls? I can give you their names. You're welcome to try."

"But—Dark Lords take unwilling servants."

"Yes, but I'm not a Dark Lord. Or any kind of—" Harry stops for a second. "Person like Voldemort."

Theodore smiles again as he catches Harry's eye. Harry shows him an impotent glare in response. He doesn't like the title, but if he goes around allowing people to call him "my lord," then he has to accept it.

And Harry will never make Theodore stop saying "my lord."

"I don't understand why anyone would want to be _branded._ Like a slave."

"You think I do?" Harry waves his hand in the air in exasperation. "I tried to talk them out of it. I tried to tell them I would do what I could for them and they could fight beside me without the mark. _None of them would listen._ This stubborn bastard over here was the first one who refused to hear me."

Theodore tilts his head at Granger when she turns to gape at him, but doesn't offer to show her the mark. That's a private thing, including the way that it looks different from the marks of Harry's other minions.

"But you can't—no one brands people who doesn't intend to take over the world. Or at least rule them."

Harry waves his hand, and a shadow curls into their bedroom and brings back a list of names. "Here. These are the people who I've marked; these are the ones I'm considering marking; these are the ones who wanted to be marked and who I'm done considering. You can look at them and decide whether any of them are cringing slaves."

"I don't," Granger says, like it's a complete sentence, but takes the parchment. "The ones that you're considering. Why not just mark them all at once?"

"The ritual I use can only be done on the new moon and only to three people at a time, that's why."

Granger makes a few more spluttering noises and then leaves. Harry rolls his eyes at Theodore. "She came here expecting to find a sociopath, right? And then left when it was too much for her?"

"I think she came here expecting to find someone she could oppose, my lord. Not someone she might consider joining herself."

Harry's enraged denial is a source of hilarity to Theodore for the rest of the day.

* * *

Harry lands from the Apparition with his hand extended. Claws of shadow are already flowing across the floor, aiming straight for the Ministry desk in the empty office. Theodore lands behind him and steps away from the shadow, watching Harry work.

They got word earlier today that Susan Bones had been arrested on an obviously spurious charge. Supposedly she suppressed her dead aunt's will and got herself a house that her aunt wanted to leave to someone else. Theodore can't think of anyone _less_ likely to do that. If anything, Amelia Bones was overly aggressive about raising an honest, perfect niece. It was even hard for Susan to lie about her mark or helping them when that was still necessary.

Harry waited only for confirmation about what department the charge was coming from before he told Theodore they were going to hit it.

Now, shadows rifle through files, documents, scrolls, parchments, memos, notes, and reports, while Harry stands with his head tilted slightly to the side and his eyes glazed. Theodore watches in pure admiration. Last year, Harry wouldn't have been able to do something like this. His shadows couldn't "read" then, couldn't tell him what words were found on which pages. Now they can, and fast at that, so that Harry just has a small pile of paper to read in the end.

Harry makes a sharp noise, and the shadows break free from the cabinets and race back to him with some sheets of parchment. He reads them and nods, focusing his burning attention on Theodore. Theodore shivers and hopes this little excursion doesn't take long, because he'd like to make good use of the rest of the evening.

"It's Montague," Harry says, his eyes flaring. "Remember that he approached me and I refused to mark him? He accused Susan of keeping the house away from a relative of his. Couldn't even be arsed to hide his name as the accuser."

"What's his fate going to be?" Theodore asks, a delicious shiver working its way down his spine.

Harry smiles.

* * *

"Were you the one who destroyed Graham Montague?"

Harry blinks at Granger, who's accosted him in the middle of Diagon Alley. In the end, Theodore did find him the perfect gift, a series of magical boxes that let his shadows practice carrying things through walls and under doorways; the boxes are charmed to turn intangible or collapse at a moment's notice without dropping the objects they hold. Theodore puts a hand on Harry's shoulder as his lord stares.

"Hermione Granger," he whispers.

"Oh, right," Harry says, and nods to her. "What is it, Granger?"

"You didn't remember my _name_?"

"It's not personal. I don't remember the names of people who don't interest me," Harry says, while Theodore hastily chokes and coughs behind his hand. "Now, what were you asking me?"

"I want to know if you destroyed Graham Montague! One minute he was accusing Bones of taking property he rightfully inherited away from him, and the next minute he's gone except for a signed confession." Granger puts her hands on her hips. "Did you do that?"

"Why would you think I had anything to do with that?"

"Because—because people who oppose you tend to disappear."

Harry sighs impatiently. "I don't keep track of who disappears and who doesn't, who moves abroad from Britain and who decides that they need to move across the country to romance some lover. I don't _rule_ anything, Granger. Will you get this notion out of your head that somehow I control everything?"

Granger squints at him. "It's too much of a coincidence."

Theodore stands at Harry's side and smiles unhelpfully when Harry glances his way. Honestly, this is funny as hell. And Harry does need to learn to be a bit more careful with how he responds to people threatening his vassals. He's not secure enough yet that no one can challenge him.

Although that day is coming. Probably within the next year, if Theodore is any judge.

"I didn't make Graham Montague disappear, Granger. Is that what you want me to say?"

And it's true, as Theodore well knows. Harry _can_ make people disappear and wander his shadows forever, but he doesn't do it often. Instead, after he got the confession out of Montague, the shadows pulled him apart. The walls of Montague's bedroom are now embedded with tiny, atomized pieces of him, bits of flesh and blood too small to be picked up by any kind of magical scan, even using house-elves. Montague is still right at home, fulfilling his last wish, which was, "Please leave me alone here."

Now he's at home. For always.

"If you did something criminal, I'm going to prove it," Granger threatens, and flounces off.

Harry sighs and rubs his forehead. Theodore bends down next to him. "Why do you leave her alive, my lord?"

"Because she's not threatening anyone I care about, and she's not even a credible threat to me," Harry murmurs. "And the twins like her. I'd like to not have to check my tea and my chairs and my sheets for itching powder or potions every single night."

* * *

"Guess who's applying to be marked?"

Harry stares at the parchment in Theodore's hand and sighs. "It's not the twins under an assumed identity again, is it?"

"No. Hermione Granger." Theodore lays the parchment on the table in front of Harry with a little flourish.

Harry looks gratifyingly blank before he rolls his eyes. "Right, the one who had problems with the way I handled Montague. Why in the world would she ever _want_ to become one of mine?"

"She says in the letter that she thinks you're going to be in control of wizarding Britain in a few years, and that she wants to reform the system from the inside. She's advancing fast in the Ministry and says she would help give you information about how you should change the position of magical creatures."

"I'll change the position of magical creatures that _help_ me and mine," Harry mutters with a deep breath of irritation. "I don't see any reason that I would consider her."

"You know that if you don't mark her, she'll be back in six weeks arguing that you should?"

"And she'll probably undermine me from without, right? Start some sort of resistance?"

"I wouldn't put it past her," Theodore says innocently, and loves the way that his lord closes his eyes in a motion too long and slow to be a blink.

"I'll give her a chance at one of those blasted vassal social evenings that Susan badgered me to put together." Harry turns and stalks towards the far side of their bedroom. "See how she does with you, Pansy, and Millicent. She has to be able to get along with people who weren't Gryffindors if she's going to be my vassal. If she can't, I'm not marking her no matter _what_ kind of trouble she tries to cause."

Theodore smiles. Harry turns around in time to catch it. He huffs and folds his arms. "You _want_ me to mark Granger. Why?"

"She could be a good adviser, my lord. And you could use a few more Muggleborns among your vassals. There's nothing wrong with Granger's brain, just her common sense."

"Fiiiiine," Harry says, with enough vowel sounds to make Theodore chuckle. "Now come to bed." He holds out his hand.

Theodore comes willingly. Another reason he thinks marking Granger would be a good idea, although he doesn't say it to Harry, is so that he has company in keeping Harry on his toes.

 _Bar this,_ he thinks as he lies next to Harry in bed later and admires the rise and fall of his chest. _This is mine alone._


	3. Seekers Keepers

Thank you for all the reviews! Right now, this is the last part of Shadows After War, but I will probably add to it at some point.

 _Seekers Keepers_

"I don't understand what this is. A vassal social?"

"There are enough of us now that not everybody knows everybody. So Harry organized this kind of thing so that we can keep in touch."

Granger just gazes at Susan in what reads like stupefaction, although Susan has no idea if it actually is. She took up the responsibility of getting Granger here, and that's all she has to do. She has more important people to go and find.

"Here" is the large set of gardens behind the Nott House, where Harry and Theodore took up living right after they graduated from Hogwarts. They've done some remodeling, though. Susan remembers this garden as gloomy, with hemlock trees shading it, and high hedges, and no flowers at all.

Now there's a fountain splashing in the middle, into a stone basin that seems to be decorated with protective runes. The statue in the middle of the fountain is a woman with a face like Lily Potter's that Susan has seen in a few photographs. And there's a bonfire, and most of the hemlock trees are gone—Susan thinks they're what's feeding the bonfire, actually—and there are raised beds with force-grown white flowers shining softly.

Granger walks hesitantly towards a group that includes Millicent and Justin. Susan makes for the food tables, partially because she's hungry, and partially because the person she's seeking is more likely to be there.

But she's not, and Susan has to endure congratulations on getting out of the "ambush" that Montague tried to arrange for her with the Ministry. Susan smiles through it, and now and then exchanges a greeting with someone she's friendlier with, and picks up a plate of sliced cheese, fruit, and nuts to search the darker corners of the garden.

In the end, she finds Padma with a book on a bench near one of the banks of white flowers, which actually seem to shed their own light. It's not enough for reading, though, and Padma has a _Lumos_ hovering on the end of her wand. Susan sits down next to her, and waits patiently for the blasted Ravenclaw to look up from her tome.

Padma doesn't take more than three minutes to look up, though, and when she does, her glance is long and slow, and her smile the same. She puts down the book and steals some of the nuts from Susan's plate. "Can you believe that Parvati actually asked to be marked? I'm not sure if I'm more surprised by that or by Harry's accepting her."

"I think she realized that there's more gossip in the group than outside it."

"Susan! That's rude."

"But accurate."

Padma struggles against a smile for a moment, and then does it. Susan watches the way the firelight gleams in her long black hair. "Yes, fine, all right. She had other reasons, too, including missing me, but I think that's one reason."

She reaches for a slice of pineapple. Susan reaches out and covers Padma's hand with hers.

The hand trembles a little under her touch. "I—Susan, you were just waking up from a very addictive potion when you told me—"

"That I love you? That I want to be with you? I don't care. It's the truth." And Susan was recovering from a less addictive potion at the time, thank you very much. It was after one of the last post-war skirmishes, when a group of former Death Eaters attacked some of Harry's vassals in Hogsmeade. Susan took a Cutting Curse to the stomach—something she's _still_ annoyed with herself for—and had to stay in the hospital wing and on potions for a week. But Padma visited five days in.

"How can—we never even spent that much time together." Padma's head is bowed, her hair falling forwards around her face.

Susan gives in to her desire, and reaches out to stroke the hair. Padma hitches in a trembling breath, but doesn't object. "No, we haven't spent all our time together the way Harry and Theodore do." She rolls her eyes when Padma looks quickly up, so she can see it's a joke. "But, Padma, we've had great conversations. And you understand revenge. And we both want power. And you listened to me babble when I was on that _other_ addictive potion for depression and never told anyone."

"Who would be interested in how much you were grieving for your aunt?" But Padma's joke falls flat, and Padma shivers a little as she reaches out to curl her fingers around Susan's. "Susan…"

"Just say that you'll give us a chance," Susan interrupts. Ernie would tell her it was Hufflepuff stubbornness, but with a note of pride in his voice. Susan doesn't care if Padma calls it the same, just as long as she _does_ give them a chance. "I want to know that you'll go on a date with me instead of putting me off again."

"Why do you think I did that?"

"Because your family won't approve of a woman dating a woman?"

"They—they already don't approve of the fact that I let Harry mark me. I hope they'll come around now that Parvati's doing it, too, but I don't want to strain my relationship with them any further."

"Then let it remain among the vassals for now," Susan says. "You don't have to move in tomorrow. But date me. Dance with me tonight. Kiss me."

Padma swallows and looks up. "I'm not from the House of the brave," she says. "I thought you would go away if I just waited. I thought my dreams would go away." She pauses.

"But?" Susan prompts. She's not from the House of the brave, either. Just the exceptionally stubborn.

"They didn't go away. And I don't want to sit around and do nothing my whole life out of fear of what someone else might think."

Padma's hands are trembling as they rise and touch either side of her face. Susan leans forwards, and sees the firelight sparkling in Padma's huge, dark, beloved eyes, too, just before they close and they kiss.

For a first kiss, it's very nice, dry and soft, and Susan is smiling when she pulls back. Padma leans her head on Susan's shoulder, and Susan combs her hand through Padma's hair.

* * *

Later, after Harry has marked Parvati and a young Auror named Hestia Jones, they dance together, Susan with her cheek pressed to Padma's and her arms around her for the first time. They are both good, graceful dancers. That's at least one lesson pure-blood parents provide for their daughters, and Aunt Amelia always insisted that Susan would know how.

Susan smiles a little as she thinks of her aunt. For the first time in years, the memories don't hurt. Susan thinks she can move forwards, now.

They're getting more food when Granger stumbles up to them. She looks a little wild around the eyes.

"Yes?" Susan asks. Someone else is going to be Apparating Granger home, but she wonders if Granger forgot.

"I—there's so many _debates_ here!" Granger all but explodes. "And they know more about history than I do! And—and there's _Percy Weasley_ here!"

She says it like Percy's decision to be marked is the one that might sway her to be really loyal to Harry, instead of just trying to convince him that he's wrong. Susan carefully doesn't roll her eyes. For her part, she thinks Percy joined Harry for power, not for moral reasons, but he does have to be loyal or Harry wouldn't have marked him.

"Yes, we're like that, Granger," Padma says, smiling at her. Susan curbs jealousy that says all Padma's smiles should be for _her_. It's ridiculous, how much more she wants of Padma now that she has her. "We're not all the same, and you'll need to be able to get along with more than Weasleys if Harry agrees."

"It's amazing," Granger says, and wanders away, hopefully to engage someone else in debate. Padma turns back, and nearly chokes on her sliced pineapple. Susan hopes it's the way she's watching her. From Padma's downcast eyes—and the blush that Susan _thinks_ she can see tinging Padma's delicate brown skin—it probably is.

"Come on," Susan whispers, holding out her hand.

"But the party's not over for hours yet."

"That's not going to matter."

Padma opens her mouth, seems to realize what she's about to say, and nods. The probable blush deepens. Susan intertwines their fingers tighter, and leads Padma to the edge of the gathering.

They see Harry and Theodore on the way, Theodore leaning back against Harry and both of them looking up at the sculpture of Lily Potter. Harry is running his hands delicately down the sides of Theodore's neck. Theodore has his eyes closed, so Harry is the one who sees them and inclines his head with a faint, relaxed smile. Two shadows spring up from either side of him and bow to Susan and Padma, then detach from the rest and follow them to the Apparition point.

 _Well, it's nice to know that we have our lord's blessing,_ Susan decides, and then puts her arms around the only woman she wants to take home tonight, and Apparates.

 **The End.**


	4. The Non-Conquering Dark Lord

**Title:** Hermione Granger and the Non-Conquering Dark Lord **  
Disclaimer:** J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this for fun and not profit. **  
Pairing:** Background established Harry/Theodore and Susan/Padma **  
Content Notes:** Massive AU, angst, values dissonance, sequel, violence, gore, present tense **  
Rating:** PG-13 **  
Wordcount:** 5400  
 **Summary:** Hermione never thought she would end up as one of Harry Potter's marked vassals, but here she was. Now she needs to guide Harry Potter the best she can as he prepares to take over the wizarding world. Except he doesn't appear like he really wants to do it...  
 **Author's Notes:** This is a sequel to both my fic _Shadow Magic_ and the short fics that follow it, "Shadows After War." Make sure that you've read both of those to understand the set-up of the AU (especially since Hermione is not in on a lot of the secrets and you won't be able to understand them just from her POV).

 **Hermione Granger and the Non-Conquering Dark Lord**

Hermione regards the wolf-and-lightning symbol in a mirror she's conjured. Then she nods and steps out of the circle in which she knelt while Potter marked her. She supposes that the painkilling potion trickling through her veins at the minute is making this seem like less of a big deal than it otherwise is, but...

At the same time, she can't help thinking, _That was_ it?

Everyone she's talked to made it seem like being marked was a big deal. And Hermione expected pomp and ceremony based on the stories of Death Eaters receiving Dark Marks that she's read in books and that circulated quietly around Gryffindor Tower. But no, it was just an oath and a potion and a ritual on the night of the new moon. No torches. No chanting. No having to cast the Cruciatus Curse on a hapless Muggle.

Of course, if it had been like that, Hermione never would have chosen to serve Potter anyway. But details.

She looks around, and catches Susan's eye. Susan smiles at her. She's one of the first people who Hermione approached about getting the mark and who encouraged her to keep at it when Potter seemed uninterested in placing her among his vassals at first. Now, _now_ , they can be equals.

Well, sort of. Hermione still can't tell everyone her secret agenda, which is keeping Potter from turning the wizarding world into a cesspit. Now that Voldemort has been defeated and Professor Dumbledore has vanished, it seems that Potter is the one who will take over and change the world.

She can't do anything from the outside. Hermione accepted that already. Potter is too powerful and everyone in the Ministry seems intent on ignoring the threat, the same way they did when Voldemort first came back to life. So she'll reform from the inside.

"Come on." Susan links her arm companionably with Hermione's. "We're going back to Theo's house for a celebration now."

"Oh." Hermione glances over her shoulder to watch the other two new vassals leave the circle. One is a Ravenclaw boy she doesn't know at all, who was a year below her in Hogwarts, and the other is Astoria Greengrass. Greengrass is smiling in an exultant, radiant way that makes Hermione a little uncomfortable. The boy just seems quietly pleased.

"Are you all right?"

"Perfectly," Hermione says, turning back to Susan, who's now peering at her as if she's Madam Pomfrey and will order Hermione to rest any second. "Why?"

"You looked as if you couldn't understand Astoria's reaction."

"Well, I mean...I accept that it's different for her. I know that the Greengrass family has been Potter's allies for a long time, and—"

"Our lord."

"What? I know he is."

"No, Hermione." Susan looks pained, and stares off into the distance as if wondering how to phrase this. "I mean that you should address Harry as _our lord_ for a while, until you get used to thinking of him that way. It's fine to call him by his first name once you get used to it, but I don't think that you are right now."

"I did become his vassal willingly," Hermione protests. Just like she always heard about the Dark Mark, one can't take the Shadow Lord's mark unless they're willing.

"Yes, I know," Susan says. "But you look as though you think this is, I don't know, like getting hired at a special office in the Ministry or something. It's not. It's much more than that, and I'd like you to promise me that you'll think about it."

Hermione shakes her head a little. She doesn't know what there is to think about. This is a big step, but she made up her mind to do it and chose the mark. "I've thought about it, Susan."

Susan gives a long-suffering sigh that Hermione doesn't understand, but whisks her away to the party, and it is an interesting experience.

* * *

"My lord." Hermione makes sure that her voice is respectful as she comes through the door into the drawing room of what is, apparently, Nott's house and sits down. She can be plenty respectful. After all, Harry Potter is the Boy-Who-Lived and the most powerful wizard in Britain at the moment as well as the man who marked her. "Do you have time to discuss some of my ideas?"

Potter looks up from juggling a ball of shadow. "Of course, Hermione. I set aside this afternoon for you, after all."

Hermione flushes, but doesn't show any sign of discomfort other than that. She won't let herself. "Of course," she says brightly back. "I wondered if you could take a look at my plans for the Department and Regulation of Magical Creatures."

Potter lets the ball of shadow dissipate and stretches out along the couch, looking bemused. "What do you want to do with it?"

"Stop them from persecuting magical creatures, of course," Hermione says, a little surprised. Hasn't Potter listened to anything about her campaigns? She thought that was the reason he finally gave in and marked her, after long months of resisting. "I know that you were in Professor Lupin's Defense classes. Don't you think it's _wrong_ for him to have lost his job the way he did?"

"I don't like Lupin. He kept the fact that he knew my parents from me."

Hermione blinks. "Oh," is what she says, and it takes her a moment to rally. "But you would agree that werewolves don't need to lose their jobs over their affliction?"

"Depends. Are they loyal to me or not?"

"What? What does that have to do with a _detached ethical principle?_ My lord," Hermione manages to tack on to the end, not keeping the irritation out of her voice.

"Because I only act when someone loyal to me is threatened," Potter says, as if that makes sense or is ethically defensible.

"I don't really believe that, my lord. After all, you defeated Voldemort." Months since the end of the war means Hermione can say the name without flinching.

"Only because he threatened Theodore. I was willing to let the stupid bastard live until then."

Hermione finds himself with nothing to say. This isn't at all the kind of man she thought she would confront. She thought she would have to beat back evil impulses, not—drag him out of his shell.

"But why?" she settles for asking. "After all, Voldemort wanted to kill you, too, because you defeated him when you were a baby."

Potter shrugs and sits up on the couch. The shadows stretch around him like a cloak. Hermione doesn't think that he even realizes how much he uses them. It's more as if they're a fifth limb. "He came back sane because he used the Philosopher's Stone. We could have struck a deal. He could have left me alone and I would have left him alone. But he was too much of an arse to give up on claiming Theodore. Just because the Death Eaters swore themselves to him, he thought he had first claim on all of their children, too."

Hermione stares in horror. Potter tilts his head at her. "What?" he asks, and something like a warning thrum runs through Hermione's mark.

"You—I thought you were a Dark Lord."

"I am. Sort of."

"But I thought you cared about the world enough to want to harm it," Hermione continues in a small voice, hardly believing the words even as she says them. "It hardly sounds as though you care about anything."

"The people who swore themselves to me."

"But—you don't want to reform laws? Change the wizarding world? Make sure that Muggleborns have more rights? Or pure-bloods, even? You don't want to research the cause of your shadow magic?" Hermione knows she sounds like she's begging, but she expected an _opponent._ Not this, whatever it is.

"I have a fairly good grasp on what causes my shadow magic, I think, and it's not something that's likely to fade or leave me alone." For some reason, Potter is smiling, his eyes bright green with mischief. "But no, I don't want to do any of the other things you named. Why would I?"

Hermione looks at him and thinks about all the things she could say, but she has to admit, they're not likely to have much impact on him if what she's said so far hasn't. "What is the source of your shadow magic?" she asks, since that seems to be the one thing he was willing to talk about.

"That's not something I share with just anyone, Hermione."

"I know. But I'm one of your vassals now."

"I know," Potter echoes her. "That's why I can remember your name." He sits up. "Well, if you don't have anything else to say, perhaps you can go home."

Hermione lets her mouth fall open and shakes the binders she brought at him. "But I have so much to _talk_ to you about! Laws, unfair discrimination, reducing the privileges the pure-bloods can claim! Why aren't we talking?"

"Because I don't care about any of those things." Potter props his chin on a palm and watches her, cool and amused. "You're one of my vassals, which means that I'll protect you and that I'll try to help you with what you want to achieve—"

"Then—"

"Without changing the way I normally act." Potter yawns a little. "If you want money to succeed in your endeavors, I can give you that. Merlin knows I'm not going to use all of mine. I can also introduce you to people in the Ministry who might share your goals and might be willing to work with Muggleborns. But I'm not going to go out and transform into a conqueror because you want me to."

"I don't want that! I want to _stop_ you from being a conqueror!"

"Huh?"

Hermione flushes. The way Potter makes the sound isn't flattering. "I know that you're going to take over the wizarding world someday," she says, tilting her chin up. "That's exactly the reason I wanted to be your vassal. I thought that I could influence you to use your power for good instead of evil."

Potter stares at her with his eyebrows arched a little and his lips slightly parted. Hermione gets the sensation that it's the equivalent for him of a dropped jaw from anyone else.

Then he stands, shakes his head with a small snort, and says, "Go home, Hermione," before he strides across the room. Hermione jumps to her feet, because she's not about to be dismissed like that, but Potter walks into a shadow.

And vanishes.

Hermione shivers. She has forgotten how unnerving it is when Potter does that, especially since she's only watched his shadow magic in operation a few times to know what she's looking at.

She glances around the sitting room. There are multiple shadows flickering from the large fire, and a torch somewhere upstairs is casting light down the steps, which means there are more, and Potter could be standing in any one of them, watching her, moving around behind her, getting ready to follow her.

She packs up her binders and goes home.

* * *

"Why did you join Potter?"

Susan gives her an odd glance as she pours another cup of tea. Padma is asleep on a couch across the room, which Hermione knows is the reason that Susan's glance morphs into a smile for an instant as she looks past her. It's certainly nothing Hermione did herself. "Why do you call him by his last name?"

"You said I should be more formal," Hermione protests, picking up the tea. Already, this feels as if it's going wrong. It's become a depressingly familiar feeling over the last few days.

She's talked to several other fellow vassals about how she can persuade Potter around to supporting a progressive agenda. All of them just stared at her. Finally, Hermione decided that she should speak to Susan, who has been with Potter longer than any of the others Hermione chose, and get a clear answer.

"That sounds like you're about to start scolding him any second, though. He's not a Hogwarts student any longer, Hermione, and you're not a prefect."

That just causes Hermione to remember that when she and Susan were both prefects, Susan was a marked vassal of Potter's and serving someone who was planning to defeat Voldemort and destroy the Dementors. She changes the subject. "I know. I just—I want to know more about what people who get their projects supported by him do."

"You know he would be willing to support almost anything if you can convince him it's a good idea."

"But I can't convince him! How did you do it?"

"I wanted vengeance because Voldemort murdered my aunt." Susan cradles the cup in her hands and peers at Hermione as if seriously doubting her sanity. "He promised to protect me and help me along the way to get that vengeance, and in return, I did things like shelter him and Theodore in my house and help them with the research they needed."

"Research?" Hermione is torn between approval and aggravation that no one ever asked _her_ to help with that research.

"Yes, about the things we needed to do to destroy Voldemort." Susan looks at her again. "But you didn't join for vengeance."

"No, I joined to make the world a better place."

"You can still do that. Just don't expect our lord to care."

Hermione sits back, confounded. She knows Potter cares on a regular basis. She's heard the rumors—always just rumors—of him destroying people. She watched the way he marched into the Great Hall with his shadow magic flaring around him before he went to fight Voldemort on Azkaban. And there's the mysterious disappearance of Professor Dumbledore right after he said in an Order of the Phoenix meeting that something would have to be done about "young Potter."

"What kind of impact does he want to make on the world, then?"

Susan smiles. It looks unexpectedly fond. "Honestly? He wishes more people would leave him alone."

"But he marks all sorts of vassals! He marked you!"

"Mostly either to protect us, like people who were being bullied, or because we wouldn't go away and stop pestering him. Except maybe for Theodore. There, it's different. A word of advice, Hermione: don't ever bother Theodore."

"I already did, before my marking, and it wasn't a problem."

Susan snorts. "Then believe me, our lord didn't think of what you did as 'bothering.'" Her voice softens. "Hermione, what's really the matter? I know that you're smarter than to think he would agree to all your plans right away."

Hermione takes a deep breath. Susan wants her to be honest, she'll be honest. "He's raising an army. He destroys his enemies or anyone who gets in the way of his vassals, and no one dares stand up against him. I know that he's planning to take over the Ministry. I'm just trying to soften that takeover. Make sure that some of the ideals I love and people like me love are represented in the new world order."

A moment later, Padma stirs and complains, "Susan, I was taking a _nap._ What are you laughing about?"

* * *

Hermione sits in front of her own fire and frowns at the mantel, and the photographs that stand above it. One is of the Order of the Phoenix the way they were in the summer between sixth and seventh years, when they were gathering intelligence and preparing to fight a war. Professor Dumbledore stands with one hand on her shoulder and one hand on Sirius Black's, his smile soft and grim. It was a challenging time, but Hermione always believed they would win.

She doesn't feel that way now.

She nibbles at her sandwich and frowns. Potter is clearly powerful. He's clearly not always on the right side of the law (she shies away from "evil" because she doesn't know for sure if he did do something to Professor Dumbledore, and most of the other things he admitted to were in the middle of a battle). He has the vassals that usually follow a Dark Lord around.

But he _doesn't_ want to take over the Ministry? He'll fund her projects but he doesn't care that much if they succeed?

It's baffling.

* * *

"Can I, um, talk to you, Nott?"

Theodore Nott nods at her briefly, and tosses the _Daily Prophet_ he just bought into a basket hanging over his arm. "Of course. And call me Theodore. We are both his now."

Theodore doesn't say that loudly, since they're in the middle of Diagon Alley, but he doesn't say it quietly, either. The people who are shopping around them glance at them but don't linger and stare. Hermione is about ready to give up on what exactly she _should_ be doing or saying or thinking. There's no logic to it.

"Why did you join him?"

"I started seeing Harry as my lord our first year at Hogwarts. There was no reason not to join him."

Hermione sighs. "That doesn't help. I just want to know what his political ideals and beliefs are, and I thought I could learn that by talking to the other vassals, so I could know how much he would want to fund me and what he plans to do with the Ministry."

Theodore looks up from studying beetle eyes at an outdoor apothecary. "He doesn't plan to do anything with the Ministry."

"But it can't go on existing the way it is!"

"Why not?"

"Because—because!" Hermione is angry to find that she just doesn't have the words, but angrier that Theodore can think that the Ministry is fine the way it is. She waves her hands around and steps in front of him when Theodore sticks the scoop in the beetle eyes and pours them out to take a closer look. "It's horrible to Muggleborns and magical creatures! It's full of corruption! People bribe each other on a regular basis!"

"But I don't see how that affects you, unless you want to work there."

"Of course I want to work there! I want to change things!"

Theodore gently pushes her aside and sorts through the beetle eyes with the scoop again while still speaking to her. "Then talk to Harry. He can introduce you to some of our fellow vassals who work there."

"I want to succeed on my own merits!"

"Then why did you get marked?"

"Oh, it's all very well for _you_ , standing there! You're a pure-blood and you've never had to work a day in your life! You're Potter's favored vassal! It doesn't affect _you_ if the Ministry forces werewolves to register or declares giant-hunting legal or goes around Memory Charming Muggles."

"No," Theodore says peacefully, "it doesn't."

Hermione stares at him again. Then she says, "What are our lord's political ideals?"

Theodore smiles in a way to shows his teeth a little. "He doesn't have any."

"You can't just accumulate power the way he does without having them! Anyway, he chose a political side when he defeated Voldemort."

"He did that because Voldemort annoyed him by making a claim to me. And he got rid of the Dementors because they corrupted the shadows that Harry travels through and he hated them for that. Everything for him is personal, Hermione. And I know that you might be able to say that should make him more political, but it doesn't. He doesn't have to care about Muggle-baiting or giant-hunting or werewolf registration any more than I do, unless he chooses to."

"But that means he...he commits murder and genocide on a whim?"

"No, because he wanted to, and it was too much bother to let them go on existing in the world. It was also too much bother to have you nagging him constantly, so that's why he agreed to mark you."

Hermione feels her mouth fall open. She thought it was one of two things: either Potter was genuinely interested in her ideas, or he thought she was dangerous and would be better off marked. But she never guessed this.

"He'll help you," Theodore says, with the kind of quiet conviction that pure-bloods seem to think will make everything better. "He'll do anything for someone marked as his."

"Except care. Except get involved in politics." Hermione can hear the bitterness in her voice, but she doesn't know how to hide it.

Theodore gives her an extremely patient look. "If that's the only way to support what you want, then yes, that's what he'd do. But so far, I don't think it is. You say you want to earn your position on your own merits, so you don't want him to intervene in hiring for you. You say you want him to listen, but I think it's a certain _kind_ of listening, and I doubt you've explained how it would help yet. There are things he would do, but you need to get rid of the expectation that you have a tame Dark Lord here, and decide how you're going to proceed now that you know."

"It's extremely inconvenient." Hermione folds her arms.

"For him to turn out to be less evil than you thought he was?" And Theodore is laughing at her, Hermione's sure, in that reserved, cool way that's just as much a guffaw for him as the parted lips were a dropped jaw for Potter.

"He's so different than I thought he was," Hermione whispers. "I knew he wasn't the hero, the Boy-Who-Lived, but this Shadow Lord business isn't what I thought, either. I thought..."

"He doesn't want to take over the world, Hermione. He wants to make sure that his own are safe, and himself. That's it."

"That's so reactive, though."

Theodore shrugs. "It's the way he is. Honestly, if people had been paying attention in school, they would have noticed that already. He didn't go around threatening the ones who _might_ hurt or bully people. He threatened the ones who did. He didn't get himself involved in that Chamber of Secrets nonsense or go charging to seek out Black, either, when they still thought he was going to kill Harry."

"The Chamber of Secrets I don't understand at _all._ A student's life was in danger."

"And why would another student, a twelve-year-old, be the best one to handle it? Why not a grown adult? Which is what ended up happening, as much as I know about it."

Hermione opens her mouth, then closes it. It's strange, but the way Professor Dumbledore told them about it seems threadbare now, even though it was only a few years ago. He said that Harry Potter was the Boy-Who-Lived and _ought_ to have done something about it, because the Chamber of Secrets was to do with Voldemort.

But now that Hermione thinks about it, did Harry even know that? Ginny wasn't one of his friends no matter how much she wanted to be. And the artifact that Professor Dumbledore hinted darkly was causing trouble is probably something Harry never saw.

"If you want to understand? Talk to him." Theodore is paying for the beetle eyes, and he smiles a little at her before he moves on to the next apothecary.

"Yes," Hermione says to herself. "Maybe I will." And she marches away with her head higher than it was. She might have to request an appointment with Harry since that's the way he usually does things, but maybe she can learn the truth from him as long as she listens with an open mind.

It's unfortunate, she thinks later, that she didn't notice the person following her down Diagon Alley.

* * *

Hermione screams into her gag, but there's no one to hear her, and the first thing they did was take her wand.

She's bound to a chair in the cellar of a house that's large and old; that's all she really saw of it before they bundled her into the cellar. She didn't see faces, either, since they grabbed her from behind and they were wearing a hooded cloak. She has no idea why she's here, and they seem to have stabbed her in the shoulder with something, because it burns and it's itchy. She hopes it's not a potion.

"The Mudblood."

Hermione actually jumps in place. The wizard in front of her must have just removed a Disillusionment Charm, but even that's not as startling as the sight of his face. All his features are twisted as if someone made them out of molten wax and then didn't care to keep them looking like a human's.

It's the blond hair that tips her off who this is, since neither his face nor even his voice is really recognizable anymore.

"Malfoy," she whispers into the gag, and even though she didn't technically speak it, he seems to understand anyway. The twisted lips writhe in a parody of a grin.

"He dared to do this to me," Malfoy says, pacing around the cellar, waving his arms. Hermione can only understand his words a few beats after he speaks them, and by thinking hard, because there's just no likelihood his teeth and tongue are functioning in the same way. "He thought he could get away with it. Well, he _can't_!" He spins around with spittle flying from his lips and stabs a finger at her. Hermione jumps again. Yes, he must have given her a potion. The room is wavering and spinning in her sight.

"You're going to be the example, Granger."

Hermione swallows. She understands that he has some grudge against Potter, but she can't understand why he took her. Why her, of anyone? Surely it would be better to kidnap Susan or Theodore or someone else who's been with Potter for a long time. She can't even get her "lord" to pay attention to the most basic ideas about the Ministry.

On the other hand, maybe that's the point. Maybe Malfoy took a Muggleborn who won't be missed. He has to be afraid of Potter. Snatching the weakest target is surely the point.

Her shoulder is _really_ burning now, and Hermione can barely see past the film that's covering her eyes. She shivers, wondering if she should hope that Malfoy kills her before the potion, or the other way around.

"He'll pay for showing disrespect to the noble house of Malfoy..."

Malfoy's voice cuts off. Hermione shivers again. She's gone deaf. The potion must have that as a side-effect. She would start crying even harder, but she doesn't think she'll live long enough to really absorb the terrible impact.

But maybe she can still see, so she strains her eyes as hard as she can, trying to see past the film covering them.

That's when she realizes it's not really a film. The potion must be blinding her, too, because the room is much darker than it was, as if all the torches on the walls have gone out. And she's colder. The burning in her shoulder feels like—

Feels like it did the night she was marked.

"You touched one of mine, Malfoy."

The voice comes from everywhere and nowhere at once, and now Hermione can see, because her vision readjusts to what's actually in front of her and not what she expects to be there. The torches are still present as muted light, but the shadows are stretching out in front of her and swirling around Malfoy's feet, and Hermione can see some of them assuming the forms of pointed heads, serrated teeth, flicking tongues.

Malfoy's voice didn't cut off because she went deaf. Malfoy's voice cut off because he's bloody terrified. It's hard to make out the expression on his damaged face, but Hermione manages.

"It's—it's not what you think." Malfoy is backing up with his wand in his hand, and he says something then that Hermione honestly can't make out, between the strange angle of his mouth and the fear in his voice.

"Yes, it is. Hermione." The voice seems to turn towards Hermione, although she doesn't actually see anything of Potter—of Harry. Only the head of one of the shadow creatures turns to face her. "You may want to close your eyes."

Later, Hermione thinks she should have listened.

But she keeps her eyes open, because she thinks she should bear witness to something that's done for her, and so she sees the shadow-beasts grip the sides of Malfoy's body and pull him in half. There's a thick, wet noise like the world's bloodiest rope giving way, and then there's screaming that stops and bits of bone and flesh and muscle staining the floor and there's a hand curling towards her and Hermione's trying to vomit behind her gag.

A hand pulls it out of her mouth before that can happen. Harry strokes her hair and steps out of the way as she vomits on the floor, then casts a spell to clean it up. He even casts a Breath-Freshening Charm while he's at it, and then conjures a glass and water.

Hermione is trembling when she takes it from him, after he unbinds her hands. There's no way she can look at the thing on the floor again. Luckily, Harry stands in the way so she doesn't have to.

"I c-can't—couldn't—"

"I know," Harry says comfortingly, exactly as if he understands the purpose behind her babbling. "It's all right. I can track my vassals through the mark. I felt your fear and distress and I came. I did hesitate a bit to make sure that Malfoy was alone and to see if he would reveal his motives. I'm sorry about that."

"You don't need to be," Hermione says, and stops talking. She thinks that he will never be sorry for what she thinks he should be. She's remembering what Theodore said was the only thing Harry cares about.

 _He wants to make sure that his own are safe, and himself. That's it._

Harry came for her and killed without mercy or hesitation because she's one of his.

Hermione allows Harry to assist her out of the cellar, to Apparate her home, and to make all the arrangements he'll need to make about Malfoy's sudden disappearance. Hermione isn't interested in anything about them.

She sleeps in her bed that night, starting awake several times because she wants to make sure it isn't dark. The fire in her room comforts her less than the shadow-beast curled in a huge circle around her bed, watching and alert every time she looks.

* * *

"So I've decided that I'd like for you to make some introductions in the Ministry for me."

Harry smiles at her, lounging on his couch in Nott House again, the way he always seems to be when Hermione visits. "Wonderful. I'll let Neville know. He's looking to climb the ranks, too."

Hermione blinks, very hard, over the news that shy, timid Neville Longbottom is looking to do that, but on the other hand, she's had to accept recently that she doesn't know a _lot_ about some people she thought she did. "Okay. Thanks. And—"

"I'm sorry that I let Malfoy hurt you." Harry grimaces. "I wanted to let him live with his disfigured face because that was Theodore's revenge, but I should have kept a close enough eye on him to realize he was a danger to my other vassals."

"Um. I don't blame you, my lord." That title comes more easily to Hermione's tongue than it ever has.

"But I blame myself. I promise that I'll protect you. You can count on me."

And Hermione knows she can. Just not for the things she thought she could, or that Professor Dumbledore thought they could.

Harry Potter isn't the Dark Lord she thought he was, intent on taking over the Ministry. He isn't the hero Professor Dumbledore tried to portray him as. He's as neutral as an animal, as a shadow, except for the extension of his power over the people who have accepted his mark.

"Now," Harry says, reaching out to take a glass of lemonade from a shadow skimming towards him. It's probably come from the kitchen. "Tell me what else you're going to need. What you want to do."

And Hermione, the new perspective settling around her shoulders like a cloak, does.


	5. Shadows Darken to Night

**Title:** Shadows Darken to Night  
 **Disclaimer:** J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.  
 **Pairing:** Established Harry/Theodore Nott, others mentioned  
 **Content Notes:** AU, present tense, angst  
 **Rating:** PG-13  
 **Wordcount:** 4400  
 **Summary:** Harry meets another shadow mage for the first time. He supposes he should have known that even with another one for company, he turns out to be bloody unique.  
 **Author's Notes:** One of my "From Samhain to the Solstice" fics for this year, for iria4885's request about Harry from the _Shadow Magic_ universe meeting another shadow mage. You definitely need to read _Shadow Magic_ first for context.

 **Shadows Darken to Night**

Harry has been watching the strange shadow for an hour.

It turned up for the first time last night, lying in the corner of the bathroom when Harry was getting a drink of water after an intense lovemaking session with Theodore. Harry knew immediately that he didn't control it, but he was content to leave it be. He also knew that it couldn't harm him or his vassals.

But it remained, which seems an odd choice for someone who sent it to spy on him. After all, it couldn't have told the wizard using it much. Harry got a drink of water, he pissed, he made love to Theodore, he argued with two people who wanted to be his vassals but didn't have the kind of loyalty required.

If Harry had felt any of that was important information, he would have expelled the shadow from the house already. Right now, he wants to know who commands it, and he wants to send it back to them with a message.

"My lord?"

Theodore says that even now, long after they've joined their loyalties, much more often than Harry would like. But he's concluded it's useless to try and force him out of saying it. Harry nods and turns towards the bathroom doorway. "Yes, Theodore?"

"You've been in here for an hour. Is…something wrong, my lord?"

Harry smiles. Theodore can be delicate about many things, but asking about illness makes him almost fastidious. "Everything is fine," he says, and nods to the corner where the shadow lies, although he's not sure Theodore will see it as separate from the ones that Harry generates and controls. "Someone sent a shadow to spy on us. I'm trying to figure out what it could tell them."

There's silence from behind him. Harry turns so that he's between the shadow and Theodore, because that kind of silence isn't necessarily good. He _is_ interested in Theodore's reaction, though.

"If some other mage pierced your defenses so easily, my lord…"

"You think you might be in danger? I would not have let the shadow remain if I thought it was harmful, Theodore."

"I thought _you_ might be harmed, my lord."

Harry reaches a hand back towards Theodore, and luckily, his lover understands what it means. He crosses the threshold into the bathroom and clasps it strongly. Harry leans back until he can feel the heat of his first vassal's body and murmurs, "No. It lacks the power to hurt me. I repeat, I would not have let it linger if I thought it was harmful."

"Yes, my lord." Theodore is wearing his polite mask again. "So what do you intend to do with it?"

"Send a message."

Harry stretches out his power. In the years since his defeat of Voldemort, he has learned things about his shadow magic that he would be hard put to explain to another person. He lets his awareness expand and flow down the walls, and two larger shadows reach out to engulf the little one.

He has an impression of a startled, flickering mind, like a candle in a distant window. He might be able to draw it through the shadow and dispose of it, and he would do that if he sensed hostility to Theodore or his other vassals. But the surprise seems genuine, and Harry is in the frame of mind where he might like to meet another shadow mage.

He tosses a sensation of uncoiling rope through the shadow, a darker grey path that will lead back to him when the other wizard or witch wants to follow it. The candle flickers again, and then the shadow vanishes and the connection between them with it.

Except for the taut, invisible path the rope creates, lingering there, waiting to be acknowledged.

"Everything is well now, my lord?"

Harry nods and turns around with a smile for Theodore. "It is. I'd like to go back to bed and show you what I spent that boring meeting with Helton dreaming about."

Theodore's eyes are immediately wide, and his grip on Harry's hand tight. "I'd like that," he breathes.

* * *

Harry waits in the middle of a moonless meadow, his shadows gathered around him. It's true that right now it's dark enough to provide very little light for the shadows to exist, but Harry has learned to bring them with him from other places. And if this does turn out to be a trap—if the shadow mage who sent a pulse back along the rope asking to meet with him wasn't sincere—then he can use them to kill, or use their connections to other shadows to leap back to his home.

Theodore was uneasy about Harry coming by himself, but Harry insisted. He's fascinated by the chance to meet another shadow mage, who might not want to show up if there are other people here. And it's not as though he's taking foolish risks. He just doesn't see the point in acting afraid when he's not.

He realizes the moment the shadows stir to admit someone at the other side of the field. It feels odd, as though he's a spider with an extended web and someone is plucking and pulling on it. Harry tilts his head and lets his own power flutter in welcome.

A tall figure in dark robes steps out from the shadows and casts a _Lumos_ Charm off the end of a wand. Harry appreciates the way that new light spreads across the field and provides more chances to hide or strike if he has to.

"You are a child?"

Harry faces the woman—he knows that now from her voice—with a little amusement. "No, I'm nineteen now," he says. "Will you take the hood off so I can see your face? I'd like to know who I'm dealing with."

There's a long enough silence that Harry thinks this might be a trap after all, and he starts gathering his magic around him for the leap away. But apparently the woman was only considering, because she reaches up and pulls her hood back to reveal waves of dark hair and grey eyes that look almost like Sirius Black's.

Idly, Harry remembers that Sirius sent him a present yesterday and didn't send an annoying note with it. His probation as godfather is probably going better than Harry expected. He'll have to invite Sirius to visit soon, and as long as he doesn't try to pull stupid pranks in person, things might go fine.

"What's your name?" he asks as he pays attention to the woman in front of him. Her face is lineless and ageless in a way that might be illusion crafted from shadow—finer than Harry could do it—or might be real.

"Cassandra Black."

"I _thought_ you had the look of a Black," Harry says with a little triumph. "I just didn't know you were one for sure."

"You aren't going to ask why you haven't heard of me?"

"Well, I thought I would let you explain that. But you could talk about it if you want." Harry settles himself comfortably on the grass and stares at Cassandra expectantly.

Cassandra seems thrown, but settles down, too, with a cushion of shadow between her and the grass. "I was blasted off my family tapestry at the time for being a shadow mage and not wanting to marry a pure-blood. I'd had too many shadows visit too many old houses and knew exactly what 'proud pure-bloods' got up to when they thought they were alone. My parents disowned me."

"I know that Sirius's parents disowned him, too, and other people," Harry says, studying the woman. She has a strange, spooked look to her eyes, as if she expects bad news any second. Harry wonders why _that_ is. Wouldn't you be less worried with shadow magic, since it keeps a watch on your enemies for you? That's the way it works for Harry. "But he ended up inheriting everything, you know, since he was the only one left."

Cassandra nods. "I heard about that."

"Even the ones who were blasted off the tapestry are still there, just as scorch marks. But I don't think I've heard of you."

Cassandra swallows. Then she says, "How much do you know about shadow magic?'

"Enough." Harry won't let this woman position herself above him just because she's older, and he's not about to admit his ignorance. He saw where _that_ kind of thing led when he was living with the Dursleys.

"You must not know that it makes you immortal." Cassandra slumps forwards with her elbows on her knees.

"Immortal?" Harry shakes his head. "No. So you were some ancient Black, and that's why you're not on the modern tapestry?"

Cassandra chokes. "How can you can take it so calmly?"

"I haven't thought much about death," Harry admits. Part of that is because he just knew he wanted to survive. Part of that is that he has shadow magic because he is Voldemort's Horcrux, and he had the possibility in the back of his mind that he might be immortal because of that, anyway.

"Aren't you worried knowing that you're going to outlive everyone you love?"

"I don't think so. I only _love_ one person, and I would find a way to make sure that he's as immortal as I am. I'll protect my vassals as long as they want, but I don't think most of them would ask me for immortality."

" _Vassals?_ You've taken them, like a Dark Lord?"

"Shadow Lord," Harry corrects her. It's the only title that he'll accept, and even then, it's mostly a joke from his vassals. Harry prefers it when they call him by name. "I don't want to rule the world. I'm not a Dark Lord."

"But you're still—you're acting as though you could live a normal life, or even a powerful one, when you have shadow magic!" Cassandra acts as though she's right to cringe away from him. It's an annoying reaction.

"A normal life for me would be one without vassals. But they sort of forced their way in," Harry mutters. Honestly, he doesn't know what to do with his vassals sometimes. He gets the odd feeling that they rule him more than the other way around, despite how careful everyone always is about calling him "lord."

"You _have_ to keep yourself separate from other people when you have shadow magic!"

"Why, though?"

Cassandra leans nearer and whispers as though she's confessing a dreadful secret. "Because your shadows can go anywhere and look at anything! How can you look someone in the face, knowing what you know about them?"

"I keep a certain level of observation on my vassals at all times, enough to know if they're injured or in trouble," Harry says slowly. He feels more and more like he's missing something. Is it because Cassandra is a natural shadow mage, or what seems to be one, and he got his powers because of a Horcrux? "I don't look into their bedrooms or their diaries. Why would I? I would know pretty soon if someone was trying to betray me."

"But your shadows go everywhere and watch everything—"

"No, they don't. They do what I tell them. Do you have some lack of control over your shadows?"

Cassandra shudders and covers her eyes with her hands. Shadows surge up and cover the edges of her hands like grey gloves. Harry watches with raised eyebrows. Yes, it's starting to look more and more as if being a "natural" shadow mage isn't worth it.

"I can't keep the secrets out of my mind," Cassandra breathes. "I can even look inside people's _skulls_. I can hear their thoughts. I know when they hate someone, when they want to commit murder while they're smiling on the outside, when they're indulging in perverted fantasies about someone sitting across from them. I've seen—you don't know how many murders and rapes I've seen."

"Well, no, because you haven't told me."

Cassandra jerks and looks up at him with her eyes wide. "And then I meet you, and I find that I can't look inside your head," she whispers. "Is it because your own powers protect you?"

Harry shrugs. "I don't know. I know the shadows have done what I want since I was young. I could use them to create illusions or travel or spy out secrets, and none of them ever tried to turn on me. I wonder why you're different?"

Cassandra gives a sob. "I don't know! And I know that I can't die, and the shadows repair ravages of aging on my body. I sought you out, once I knew about you, because I thought perhaps you knew something I didn't and you could teach me how to die."

"Take control of the shadows. That's the only thing I can tell you."

Cassandra gives him a miserable look and stands up. "I thought meeting another shadow mage would give me an idea of what to do, but you're as obdurate as all the others."

"All the others? Are there shadow mages besides us, then?"

"No. I mean other people I've told about my gift." Cassandra's eyes are wide and tragic. "They all said that it sounded wonderful to them to live forever. They didn't _pay attention_ when I told them how awful it really was. I thought you would at least understand since you're at risk of the same problem, but you _don't_."

Harry rolls his eyes and stands up. "I think you're being soppy about it. Your shadows are _yours_. If they're so far out of control, then something has gone wrong, with your will or your soul or your magical core. I would look for the source of the problem there rather than sobbing to the darkness and expecting answers."

Cassandra stares at him with wide, wild eyes, and then leaps into the night.

Harry shakes his head as he departs. He was right when he told Theodore that he was in no danger from the other shadow mage, but he does feel irritated that she wasted his time so badly.

* * *

"What did you mean, I could have a problem with my _soul_?"

Harry groans as he wakes up. He's in his bedroom with Theodore, and his vassals know better than to disturb him unless there's an emergency—something he would feel anyway before they could get to the door through his link to their marks. But he thinks this is probably someone who's not a vassal.

And when he opens his eyes, he's right. Cassandra is standing, half-lapped in shadow and half with a visible face, in the corner, staring at him.

"I mean that you're not firm enough," Harry says. He yawns pointedly, so that Theodore, stirring against his back and reaching for his wand, will understand that this is boring, not dangerous. "Your magic belongs to _you_. Shadows do what you tell them—and that's at least true some of the time for you, or you couldn't have come to meet me or come in like this or contacted me at all or spied on people you wanted to spy on."

"There were so few I _wanted_ to spy on." Cassandra lowers her head, and Harry finds it hard to tell the differences between the edges of her black hair and the shadows. That only increases his conviction that she could control this if she wanted to. "How do you decide whose secrets you wanted to see? Why would you want to see any at all?'

"To protect me and mine." Harry leans back so that his shoulder touches Theodore's. It's for both their benefits, but he also hopes Cassandra will take a message from the gesture and clear out of his room soon. "The magic is a gift."'

"The magic is a _curse_."

"If you see it that way, then it's no wonder you can't control it."

"What?" Cassandra's eyes are very wide, and she has one hand clasped in front of her heart, which Harry thinks is a bit unnecessarily dramatic. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," Harry says, and lets his patience leak through his voice a little, "that if you think something is a curse and go out of your way to avoid learning about it, then it's no wonder that you can't control it. Your magic will do what it thinks it _should_ to benefit you. I would place a large sum of money on the wager that those secrets that your shadows seek out do benefit you in some way, if only because they might stir your curiosity. When you truly want to visit a certain place, you can do it. You aren't transported helplessly through time and space. You can control this. You just don't want to, because thinking of yourself as a victim suits your soul better."

Cassandra's eyes shimmer with tears that don't fall. Then she abruptly disappears in a rush of wind. Harry shakes his head and lies back down in bed.

"What was that all about?" Theodore asks his shoulder in a sleepy voice.

"Someone treading a path that I might have walked if not for the fact that I just _don't care_ what other people think of me."

Harry shuts his eyes and shudders a little. He hopes he won't have any nightmares about ending up like Cassandra did tonight.

* * *

"You meant what you said."

Harry rolls his eyes at the wall of the bathroom before he glances over his shoulder to see Cassandra hovering behind him. "I virtually always mean what I say," he replies. "But what about this particular thing?"

"You meant that you could control the shadows, and they just obey you."

"Yes. There's this remarkable thing, it's called strength of will."

Cassandra ignores him, and also ignores the fact that Harry has just got out of the shower and only has a towel wrapped around him. "I've been watching you. The shadows—they _do_ obey you."

"Yes." Harry rubs his hair dry with another towel than the one around his waist. He wouldn't care, but Theodore gets touchy about things like that.

"But it's because you have no heart."

"I can feel it beating any time I want."

"You know what I mean." Cassandra clasps her hands and acts as though she's going to pace back and forth, even though part of her is still shadowy and dangling through the wall. "You don't have any caring or compassion for people. I think that's the price you've paid to control the shadows."

"I care for my lover. I care for my vassals." Harry shrugs and sits down on the toilet, bending down to make sure his feet are dry. "And it's not as though you have lots of people who love you because you've failed to control your shadows."

Cassandra freezes and stands with her shadow-covered back to him. "What?"

"You heard me."

"But—I've always striven to have love and compassion towards others…"

"And what did it win you?" Harry casts a charm on the towel that dried his feet so it'll dry faster, and flings it at a rack. It falls on the floor. He sighs. Well, that's why they have house-elves. "Nothing. No regard from your family, just a disowning. You've never found someone you could sympathize with, even if you met other shadow mages. I've never met anyone who has my kind of power except you, but I've made a life for myself."

"A _selfish_ life. You're a _Lord_."

"Like that was my idea?"

Cassandra glances over her shoulder, neck twisted at an impossible angle. Harry has to admire her level of control over the shadows and the way that her flesh blends with them. He doesn't think he could do that. Of course, he has almost everything else she will never have.

"What do you mean?"

"Other people didn't just want to be my friends and allies. They wanted a level of protection from me, and they wanted some kind of bond to me." Harry squints thoughtfully at Cassandra. Now that he thinks about it, maybe he should be thanking his vassals for their insistence. He could easily have drifted away and become someone like Cassandra, without ties to anyone except maybe Theodore, if they hadn't pressed. "Thus the vassal bond."

"It just seems so selfish. I didn't want to have that kind of power over people."

"I don't think of it as power over people, not really. I just didn't want to be _bothered._ "

"But you're selfish anyway." Cassandra looks at him again, as if trying to see his soul beneath the skin.

"That much is true." Harry snorts when he sees her skeptical look. "I was raised by Muggle relatives who abused me. I was yearned after by people who thought they knew me because I was the Boy-Who-Lived. Trying to live a selfless life wouldn't have worked even if I wanted to. I would have given up everything, and it wouldn't have been enough. People had competing visions for me, and I couldn't please everyone."

"None of that tells me what _I_ should do."

"That's because you have to decide to please yourself." Harry Summons clothes from where he's left them hanging behind the door, safely far from the shower, but he holds them, not wanting to remove the towel from around his waist because of Theodore's sensibilities. "You stood up for yourself at least once, when you refused to marry the man your family picked out for you. Why can't you do that again?"

"If I hurt someone…"

"Wanting to have more control over your magic won't hurt anyone. Wanting to die, if that's what you want, won't hurt anyone. Besides, the way you are, at least one person is being hurt."

"Who?" Cassandra demands, with the directness of someone who's looking for a chance to be a martyr.

Harry raises an eyebrow at her. "Yourself."

Cassandra gives a sob and disappears, leaving Harry free to finally get dressed.

* * *

"I thought about what you said. And I understand, now."

Harry feels Theodore tense behind him, but he keeps lying right where he is, with his head in Theodore's lap and his legs stretched out in front of him. It's a beautiful starlit night, and he and Theodore are out in the meadow behind Nott House, watching a fountain play. "You understand which part of it?"

Cassandra glides around in front of him on a cushion of curling shadows like a flying carpet. Harry studies it in curiosity. It's a brilliant idea, and one that he promptly wants to try.

Theodore has relaxed again. He understands that there's nothing to be afraid of if Harry is relaxed. Harry wishes that some of his other vassals had that temperament. They're sweet, of course they are, but they refuse to accept that he can defend himself.

"I realized that I could control things, if I want to," Cassandra whispers. "And—I tried. And my shadows stepped invading bedrooms around me."

Harry smiles. "I told you. They only did it in the first place because you thought of bedrooms as repositories of dirty secrets, and so they were trying to serve you in bringing you what you thought you wanted to hear."

Cassandra swallows and nods. "And I think I know the way to die if I want."

"Do tell me." Harry isn't even pretending his interest. If it turns out that he is immortal and someday he doesn't want to be, then he'd like to know how to get rid of that "blessing."

"I'll tell the shadows that I want to enter them, the way I always would when I wanted to travel somewhere, and then I simply won't come out."

"That would mean that you would wander the paths of shadow forever rather than die, though."

"I think I know how to let myself go further and further, into the place where there are no shadows because there's no light to cast them."

Harry nods slowly. That makes sense, now that he thinks about it. He has never been able to travel through areas of absolute light or darkness, unless a shadow runs through them and comes out the other side, intersecting somewhere with a different shadow being cast. He has avoided them on instinct, not because he knew they were dangerous, but to step into one on purpose will almost certainly kill a shadow mage.

"Thank you, Harry Potter." Cassandra Black sweeps him an elegant bow. "I wish I could stay to teach you some of the lessons about shadow magic you will find it hard to learn elsewhere, but I have my own destination."

"You must go where you are needed, of course," Harry says politely, and barely manages not to roll his eyes. To teach him anything useful, she would have to be a different person.

Cassandra nods, her eyes bright with something that might be called happiness by someone with less experience of it. Then she turns and vanishes.

Harry lies further back and sighs as he listens to the noise of small frogs around them. Theodore's hand moves hesitantly through his hair.

"You would—you would tell me if you wished to die, wouldn't you, my lord?"

Harry tilts his head back and lifts an arm, and Theodore lowers his head, already anticipating Harry's desire for a kiss. Harry licks his lips as he draws back. "Of course," he murmurs, "but I don't think I'll want it until decades have passed. Maybe centuries."

Theodore's eyes brighten more than Cassandra's. At the moment, Harry hopes he _is_ immortal. He is never going to tire of looking at Theodore's eyes. "Good. I don't want to lose you, Harry."

Theodore rarely calls him by his first name, and then only when in the grip of some powerful emotion. Harry turns towards him, links his arms around his waist, and shakes his head. "Just because the only other shadow mage I've known was mad doesn't mean I am. I embrace life. She retreated from it long ago."

Theodore smiles again at his words, and he is growing hard beneath Harry's cheek. Harry does something about that.

And they are quiet in the meadow, among the shadows and beneath the stars.

 **The End.**


End file.
